Take That Insomnia! SMACK! FWOP! BANG!

I know it's been a week since I last updated, but none the less, here it is!

28March2005 – Monday

Not really a whole lot to tell about Monday. We had studio and discussed our project to some great lengths within our group and then worked on our project to some great lengths within our group. The only real thing I guess I can report is that I still had Insomnia pretty bad and that night I had gone to sleep around 6am and got up at about 2pm.

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29March2005 – Tuesday

Again a rather monotonous day, went to class as usual, turned in my paper on time – as unusual, ate food, took a nap, went to stone carving – had a pretty good time and started my “final” project… went to dinner… ah, yes, Tuesday night I devoted most of the night to studio and helped Marcus work on our model before having another attack of Insomnia which I spent online and went to bed around 4am I think.

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30March2005 – Wednesday

I awoke at about 7:15ish to get ready for our field trip and then run to the bus which we were supposed to be at by 8am. I made myself comfortable next to Jason (from architecture, not all-major) and we spent the better part of two hours talking about random things and having a pretty good time. Finally we arrived in Terni which, let me tell you, is one of my favorite places we’ve gone yet. Terni is a very industrial Italian city and the architecture is very post war/modern. I loved it. As we walked through the streets and various squares I kept thinking to myself how it was exactly what I had been expecting an Italian city to look like. Finally, I was in the “Italian City” of my anticipation. I enjoyed myself until Peter began our 5 mile hike through an old park, around some old school and up this somewhat sketchy* street and through a maze of other streets to this housing complex that was supposed to be a big deal. It was okay I guess, it was all concrete and very modern, I wasn’t too impressed… but apparently the amazing thing was the labyrinth of gardens and terraces that snaked through the complex at various levels. Anyway so we got back on the bus at what was now after 1pm (all starving to death mind you) and started our hour long journey to Perusia. We finally arrived in Perusia but then had to circle the entire city because the bus driver had accidentally passed our turn off to park and the bus is so huge that we had to go all the way around and try again… anyway we finally got to the turn which he had passed by about a millimeter and go to our parking stop. Then we have to take this series of escalators up the mountain to the top (which is a hell of a lot better than hiking straight up that mile or two). When we finally got to the top Peter released us to go in search of food and fun for the next hour and a half before meeting again to finish our tour for the day. Well we were all ravenous and some of the girls new of this fantastic place to eat so we hurriedly walked through the city and main piazza to the little place which was closing in 5 minutes… bummer. So we split up into smaller groups and went in search of some reasonably prices establishments and I think all ended up at the same Pizzeria and Café. We didn’t end up eating till after 3 and while it wasn’t the best, it was pretty good and was definitely sustenance. So after eating we looked through the chocolate shops (because Perusia is famous for its chocolate) and found them all to be ridiculously over priced before meeting at our designated place on these nice big steps where we all basked in the warm sun until the Profs finally arrived – late as usual. We than began the 4 mile hike downhill (which was nice) and weaving all over the place because Peter had no idea where he was going – also as usual. He ended up stopping about 3 times to ask for directions before we finally found the place and I wasn’t all that impressed. It had a cool fountain waterfall thing, but other than that the buildings looked very un-proportional and I just wasn’t a fan. Anyway her we had an assignment, which was to “finish” it. Apparently they thought that the square was incomplete and gave us a half an hour to sketch our remedy to this problem. In the end I quickly decided on an outdoor amphitheater to taint the green space but we all agreed that the green space was perfect as it was. Perhaps it needed some landscaping, but none of us felt that the precious vegetation and life of the space should be destroyed just to erect another mis-proportioned building… anyway they thought that was fine and we had about 10 minutes before the bus was going to get there. Lucky for us there was a Co-Op literally right under us, so I stopped in there to get a few items I had been needing before embarking on our journey home. I slept all the way home (about an hour) and then we went to dinner and what not, but I didn’t eat as I was still full from eating only 3 to 4 hours earlier. I ended up spending another night in studio working on the model with Marcus and other various tasks that needed doing. Before another attack of Insomnia and forcing myself to go to sleep around 2am to get up again at 7 for Thursdays field trip.

*The term "sketchy" is now being used by us crazy kids to describe places or things that arent of the highest quality. I believe it originated in some of the preppier more North-Eastern schools back in The States.

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31March2005 – Thursday

Like I just said, I got up at 7 and ended up at the bus on time by some miracle and this time I had a seat to myself somehow. So I napped and jammed on the way to Siena before we got off and hiked to our meeting point. There we split up into groups and I was chitchatting with Melanie our TA. At some point as the group was leaving Andrea came by and told us that Marcel’s wife was in line for the restroom and it was a long one and someone should wait for her, so we told her to go tell Marcel that and we stood by to wait. Well we waited and waited and waited… finally Melanie went down to the restroom and called her name into it with no response. Great, so we were now totally separated from the group and honestly, didn’t mind much so we decided we’d jus do our own thing for the day and started to try and find the sights on the list. We found the first and the second before running into the group of All-Major students from A&M and decided to tag along with them because Melanie finds Paolo extremely interesting and he was the one giving the tour. This was fine and dandy for me because I got to hang out with all the cool All-Majors kids and had a good time with Jen, Diego, Lauren, Wes, Daniel, etc, etc, etc… So we went to some more sights, the most fun being the top of this unfinished façade that we had to climb not one, but two flights of circular stairs that were about as wide as I am and pretty steep. It was a lot of fun and we all just about died doing it, but the view was amazing. We could see all of Siena and the surrounding country side and mountains and it was beautiful. Obviously lots of people took this opportunity for photos and such, before we started our decent which was much faster and extremely dizzying. At this point we were on our own to go find food and somehow going down the stairs I lost my group and when I left the museum I was all alone in a piazza with no one in sight. I looked around for a moment to no avail before Beau came out and had the same puzzled look on his face. We were really confused as to how we’d become abandoned and decided to search out anyone we could for a while. Soon enough we gave up and decided to search out food instead and somehow during our search we found our group and no food, lol. So then all of us continued the search (these tourist cities are expensive as heck) and finally found a little underground pub boasting hot sandwiches for 3 Euro. So we decided on that and Daniel, 3 girls, and I settled into a booth to dine. It was pretty good and Daniel and I both had two before we decided to leave. Of course when we were leaving it started pouring down rain and we were stuck. We still had like 4 hours before the bus was supposed to leave and had no idea what to do with the time. Eventually the rain let up a little and we decided to sprint to a coffee shop/pastry shop to kill some time and hide from the bad weather. Daniel and I finally got cabin fever and the rain had stopped so we decided to go window shopping with the other Lauren and Ara who we bumped into. I actually found a really nice short for only 26.50 Euro that I really liked, but decided not to spend my money. I found a patch for Siena eventually and we ended up waiting the last hour in the coolest most modern designed McDonalds I’ve ever seen. I got a pretty expensive milk shake which ended up being total crap and we finally made our way back to the bus. Again I slept home and then this time I ate dinner before devoting yet another evening to finishing the model and Insomnia.

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01April2005 – Friday

I think I went to bed around 6am and slept a good part of the day before doing nothing the rest of it. I watched The Incredibles with a small group and then Insomnia struck again. (I'll get you yet you dastardly villian!)

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02April2005 – Saturday

I decided Friday night that I was going to beat this Insomnia once and for all and I had already been awake a pretty long time. Well I only took a short nap for about 4 hours before getting up for the day. A had a leisurely day spent bumming around and bumming around online and was exhausted the whole day. Determined as I was though, I didn’t take any naps and stayed awake through dinner and some evening conversating with JereBeth before watching Shark Tale and eventually crashing about 12:30am.

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03April2005 – Sunday

I did it! I slept through the night! Whoop! From 12:30am to 8:30am I slept. It wasn’t the best sleep and I woke up feeling like crap, but it was sleep and through the night when I was supposed to be sleeping. Well I got up and online to talk to JereBeth for about 2 hours before she went to sleep and I decided that I felt like absolute crap and headed back to my nice bed for a nap. I slept for about 4 hours and then got up showered and dressed and then sat on my bed feeling like crap… I ached all over and my head was killing me, so I decided my beautiful muscle relaxer and anti-inflammatory couldn’t be a bad idea so I downed one of each and came down here to the lab to do my journal entry for the week. It appears I’m going to end up writing this thing on Sundays from now on, just because that’s when I’ve been doing it, so I doubt any of you will mind too much. I did get an e-mail from Grandma in Abilene this week and was pleasantly surprised and thoroughly pleased with that, so everyone else feel free to jump on the bandwagon and start following suit. (Man I love my stockpile of clichés, lol) That’s all I have for now folks, I don’t plan on doing anything of importance for the rest of the day. Everyone left for the weekend to go skiing in Switzerland so tonight I think me and the 2 other people left here from our group of 9 are going to put the finishing touches on our project that’s due tomorrow. I’m going to eat dinner later and hope it’s good. I also plan to update my picture website and organize a disk of pictures to give to the person in charge of our “Semester Yearbook” (what a contradiction...) who has requested pictures from anyone willing. Yes Mother I am going to purchase one of these, so don’t fret. Also a fun little tidbit on the agenda is that someone has decided to organize a Santa Chiara Prom, lol! As if any of us have Formal clothes to wear! So no I’ve set down to narrowing the list of girls at Santa Chiara to who I intend to ask to this fun little event. It’s going to be a tough choice as it matters so much, lol! (Yes, that was sarcasm.) Alright, well that’s really all I have, and now I must say Adieu. E-mails, messages, comments on the blog, phone calls, packages, letters, etc, etc, are all more than welcome! I love you all, and hope to hear from you soon since I miss you ferociously!
E-mail: Ink_Head@TAMU.Edu

Grazie and Gig ‘Em!
Ciao!